IN GALLOWAY CEMETERY, near Pleasant Hill, in Pike county, Illinois, may be read these tombstone inscriptions:
SAMUEL H. LEWIS
DIED
DEC. 13, 1832
Aged 64 yrs. 9 mos. 15 das.
MARY
WIFE OF S. H. LEWIS
DIED SEPT. 11, 1868
Aged 89 yrs. 25 das.
Numerous as are the descendants of this pioneer pair (hundreds of them in Pike county), no descendant now living
here knows their history or their family connections.
In the spring of 1832 a family group crossed the Mississippi river on the ice, coming out of Missouri into Pike
county, Illinois, and settling near the site of future Fairfield, now Pleasant Hill. Among these newcomers were
Samuel Hardin Lewis and James Galloway, and their wives and children, the elders being of a group of 100 families
from Kentucky and Virginia that had settled in the Spanish territory of Upper Louisiana (that portion that is now
Missouri), prior to the Louisiana Purchase and who had migrated to that region at the instance of Colonel Daniel
Boone, who received from the Spanish authorities a grant of 10,000 arpents of land (more than 8,000 acres) for
bringing these families into the territory for settlement.
James Galloway, in Missouri, had married Ursula A. Lewis, eldest daughter of Samuel Hardin Lewis and reputed in
Lewis family history to have been the first white child born in Missouri Territory (that part that is now the state
of Missouri) after the Louisiana Purchase. Ursula was born in what is now Missouri in 1803, the year of the Purchase.
Samuel Hardin Lewis, belonging to one of the most colorful families in American history, died in the first year
of his settlement in Bay Creek (now Pleasant Hill) township. His wife, who was Mary Barnett, a heroine of border
days in Missouri Territory, survived him 36 years. Their story is now being incorporated for the first time in
Pike county history.
Samuel Hardin Lewis was born in Pittsylvania county, Virginia, February 27, 1768. He bore the name of a family
group of which it has been well said that no other name in America has furnished so many warriors and officers
for their country's defense. In the old Indian wars his people matched their wits and prowess with the great tribal
chieftains in American history. Five of his father's brothers espoused the cause of the Colonies in the Revolution.
At the famous Battle of the Point, October 10, 1774, Samuel Hardin Lewis's uncle, the brave Charles Lewis, fell
in battle.
Across the background of Samuel Hardin Lewis's life may be seen moving the figures of the greatest men of early
America — the masters of old Warner Hall, the Fieldings, the Meriwethers, the Warners, the Washingtons, the Boones,
mighty men who conquered the ancient American wilderness, and then, on many a hard-fought fields, preserved to
their posterity the fruits of their victories. Truly, Samuel Hardin Lewis came of a line of warriors unexcelled
in the history of the Republic. And yet, the story of this Pike county pioneer has never been told. Heretofore
it has not even been known what his ancestry was.
Samuel Hardin Lewis was a son of John Lewis (sometimes called "Major John"), who was a son of Irish John,
who slew his Irish landlord and fled to the wilds of North America, becoming, in the American interior, the first
European settler of what is now Augusta county, Virginia, founding there, on what is still known as Lewis Creek,
a settlement surrounded on all sides by hostile Indian tribes with whom he was at constant war. Styled by Campbell
in his history as "Pioneer John Lewis," he became one of the most notable figures in the early history
of Virginia, and when Augusta county was created he and Peter Scholl, kinsman of the early Pike county Scholls,
were named by the Governor as magistrates of the new county.
Samuel Hardin Lewis's mother was Mildred of Belvoir, a daughter of Colonel Robert Lewis, who was born at Warner
Hall, the youngest son of John Lewis (called "Councilor John") and Elizabeth Warner. Councilor John Lewis
(Samuel Hardin Lewis's great grandfather) was a son of John Lewis, who married Isabella Warner and built famous
Warner Hall on the Devern river, which enters into Mob Jack Bay near the mouth of the York, in Gloucester county,
Virginia, where for near a hundred years the Lewises were lords and masters of vast estates. This John Lewis, great
great grandfather of Samuel Hardin and the first master of Warner Hall, was born about 1640. Isabella Warner, his
wife, was the daughter of Captain Augustine Warner of the British Army, and a sister of Speaker Augustine Warner.
Their only child was John Lewis (Samuel Hardin's great grandfather), who was called "Councilor John."
John Lewis, first master of Warner Hall, was a son of General Robert Lewis, who was the great great great grandfather
of Samuel Hardin. General Robert was the first of the Lewis name in America known to history of genealogy. A native
of Brecon, Wales, General Robert with his wife Elizabeth (family name missing) sailed from Gravesend, England,
in April, 1635, landing that same year on the shore of America where he founded the Lewis dynasty in the western
world.
The ancestry of Samuel Hardin Lewis, the Pleasant Hill pioneer, has been difficult to trace. None of his descendants
now living, so far as known, knows anything of his antecedents. There are no local, no family records to throw
any light upon the subject. Back in Missouri the writer has run down the ancestries of half a dozen Samuel Lewises,
only to find that they afforded no clue to the line of Pike county Samuel.
All of the recognized genealogists in America are at fault when it comes to this Pike county pioneer. The "Genealogy
of the Lewis Family in America," by William Terrell Lewis, is blank so far as Samuel Hardin Lewis is concerned.
"Lewis and Kindred Families," edited by John Meriwether McAllister and Lura Bolton Tandy, Lewis descendants,
is equally barren of any data pertaining to this branch of the Lewis family. So far as the Lewis genealogists are
concerned, Pike county Samuel Lewis was a man, like Melchizedek in the Bible, with neither father nor mother.
With the genealogists all at fault, it was necessary then to go back of the genealogists and find where they had
slipped. It appeared reasonably certain that Samuel Hardin was descended on his mother's side from the Warner Hall
Lewises. It appeared reasonably certain also that he was descended on his father's side from one of two American
pioneer Lewises, namely, the man known in history as Irish or Pioneer John Lewis, or that other early American
known as John Lewis of Henrico. There was some apparent evidence that the ancestor was John of Henrico, inasmuch
as some of the genealogists had a John Lewis, a great grandson of John of Henrico (Henrico county, Virginia), married
to Mildred of Belvoir, of the Warner Hall Lewises. An early sketch, however, of Caroline Ward, who married John
W. Lewis, son of Samuel Hardin, related that her husband was named for his great grandfather who founded Augusta
county, Virginia. This statement, while not quite correct, nevertheless tended to prove that Pioneer John Lewis,
first white settler of Augusta county, Virginia, was the American forebear of Pike county Samuel.
Opposed to this, however, were the genealogists, who seemed to have rather complete family histories of Irish John
and five of his sons, and Samuel of Pike county could not possibly be fitted into any of these families, although
evidently related to them. All were of one accord in attributing to Irish John only five sons. And here is where
all of the genealogists slipped. Irish John, in fact, had six sons instead of five, and this sixth son, who was
also named John Lewis, was the father of Samuel H. Lewis of early Pleasant Hill.
In Howe's "Historical Collections" it is distinctly stated that John Lewis (Irish or Pioneer John) had
six sons. Charles Campbell's "History of the Colony and Ancient Dominion of Virginia" also refers to
Howe's statement that Irish John had six sons. John Lewis Peyton's "History of Augusta County, Virginia,"
is another authority which quotes the statement ascribing six sons to the early settler of that county.
But more important, and establishing definitely that Irish John had a sixth son, is the biography in the Missouri
Historical Series of Robert David Lewis, long associated with the Myers & Drummond Tobacco Company of Alton
and later with the American Tobacco Company of St. Louis, whose father, James A. W. Lewis, was a son of Littleberry
Lewis, who was a son of John Lewis, he a son of Pioneer John. This biography, approved by Robert D. Lewis himself,
distinctly states that Robert D. Lewis's great grandfather, John Lewis, was a son of Pioneer John and one of the
earliest settlers in Pittsylvania county, Virginia.
Ignorance of the existence of this sixth son of Irish John Lewis appears also to have led the genealogists into
error regarding the spouse of Mildred, daughter of Colonel Robert Lewis of Belvoir, Virginia. All agree that Mildred
married a John Lewis, but they disagree as to which John Lewis it was. Some claim that Mildred married a John Lewis
who was a great grandson of John Lewis of Henrico county, Virginia, and that this was the Major John Lewis mentioned
by Colonel Robert Lewis in his will as "the husband of my daughter Mildred." However, Colonel Robert
in his will mentions also his large business transactions with Mr. John Lewis of Augusta county, indicating a closeness
of relationship with the family of John of Augusta rather than with that of John of Henrico. Furthermore there
appears to be no good reason for supposing any inter-marriage between the houses of Robert and John of Henrico,
nor were there any of the Henrico line, so far as known, who bore a military title. It was Irish John's sons who
were of the soldier line.
Other genealogists claim that Mildred of Belvoir married John, third child of the second Zachary Lewis, son of
the first Zachary, who was founder of a distinct Lewis line in America. This also is an error, as this John Lewis
of the Zachary line married Ann Lewis, who was a sister of Mildred. Lewises of the Zachary line were early settlers
at Perry, in north Pike county, among them a Samuel Lewis (grandson of Ann of Belvoir and second cousin of Samuel
Hardin), one of whose descendants married a daughter of Jesse Elledge, pioneer Pike county Baptist preacher and
grandson of the Boones.
Four daughters of Colonel Robert Lewis married kinsmen who bore the Lewis name, namely, Jane, Mildred, Ann and
Sarah. Two of them married John Lewises. Descendants of three of these inter-Lewis marriages settled in Pike county,
Illinois. Actually, the John Lewis who married Mildred was the missing (so far as the genealogists are concerned)
son of Pioneer John.
The Lewis name is one of the oldest in English history; also it is one of the most numerous and distinguished in America. It is claimed by many reputable genealogists that the name was originally spelled "Louis" and that it was known in France as early as the eighth century, when that country was an integral part of the Roman Empire.
Louis I, born 778, came to the throne upon the death of Charlemagne in 814, and his son, Louis, upon dissolution of the Empire in A. D. 817, became King of Bavaria and other German provinces.
It has been asserted that all of the Lewises in America are descended from a common stock of Huguenots who became refugees from France upon the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, at which time three brothers fled to England, from whom come all the Lewis families in America.
The records show, however, that the Lewis name was known in the counties of England for several centuries before the Revocation and that a number of Lewises were in Virginia in the new world prior to that date.
There is ample proof that Louis of France and Lewis of England are identical family names, the name being known in France for centuries before it appeared in England. Wherever the name has prevailed through the centuries, whether on the Tiber, the Thames, the Seine, the Shannon, or the James, or within the wild interior of early North America, those who bore it have been peers of royalty and leaders of men.
Pioneer John Lewis, grandfather of Pike county Samuel and great grandfather of Ursula (Lewis) Galloway, was one of the challenging figures in early Colonial history, fighting his way in the wilds of Augusta county, which in those days occupied the greater part of northwestern Virginia. Disguised, he had fled from Ireland to America to escape the vengeance of his enemies, hiding himself in the great American forests. There he coped single-handed with other enemies, more savage than those from whom he had fled, the wily and implacable North American Indians.